State Parks suffered moderate damage during storm systems
The recent series of atmospheric rivers knocked down old growth trees and inflicted moderate structural damage in Mendocino State parks. Preliminary estimates for clean up and repair after the storms range from half a million to a million dollars. More precise numbers will be available after a thorough investigation of the costs to replace a couple of bridges over Little River, in the Van Damme State Park.\n\nTerry Bertels is the District Superintendent for the Sonoma Mendocino Coast District of California State Parks. The district has 23 parks, 17 of which are in Mendocino County. The parking lot at Van Damme beach was especially hard hit with water and debris, which called for a significant cleanup effort.\n\n\u201cThen as you go further inland from the beach parking lot, we had as many as 70 trees that came down across trails in Van Damme,\u201d he said. \u201cWe had two bridges across Little River that are basically destroyed and will have to be re-engineered and rebuilt. That\u2019s obviously going to take a little bit of time. So that was probably the worst damage across a unit that we had. Certainly, we had a lot of tree damage across the district. We lost, I believe it was four old growth trees across three different park units. We lost one significant old growth in Montgomery Woods, we lost one significant old growth and then a small probably old growth in Hendy Woods, and then we lost one old growth in Armstrong Redwoods near Guerneville. Of course, there\u2019s no coming back from the loss of an old growth. So those are especially painful. Beyond that, we had trees that came down in campgrounds,\u201d which are starting to open up again. Mendocino Woodlands State Park also lost a water tank from a tree falling on it, and a vehicle was damaged. \u201cJust lots and lots of trees across the district that have come down,\u201d Bertels concluded.\n\nSome of the fallen trees had to be cleared away from roads and trails, but at least one in Hendy Woods and another in Montgomery Woods will remain to continue serving a role in the ecosystem. One in Hendy Woods fell next to a trail, so the hole will be filled, but Bertels said of the tree that, \u201cAs it sits right now, it\u2019s a pretty healthy tree that\u2019s lying on the ground, and in all likelihood it\u2019s going to continue to serve the park as a nurse tree for insects and decay fungi and you name it\u2026Certainly the one in Montgomery Woods, it basically exploded when it hit the ground, so it\u2019s going to serve the park as well. I think the intention is, they had a long life doing what they did, and now they\u2019ll have a long life serving the rest of the ecosystem in the parks.\u201d\n\nTourist destinations were affected, too, like the barn at Spring Ranch, which is a popular wedding venue, with a seating capacity of 200 people. Bertels reported that the barn further back from Highway 1 lost a portion of the roof from the south side. \u201cThe barn\u2019s not in great shape,\u201d he conceded; \u201cbut we did have hopes and designs to try to get that roof replaced and do some structural repairs inside to keep it upright. The plan right now is to have an architect of historical structures come in and review the structure and give us an idea of whether it\u2019s feasible to get it on better footing.\u201d That has yet to be determined.\n\nAnother visitor favorite was breached by the waves. While wet winters used to be common, Bertels doesn\u2019t think the last series of storm systems is a return to the old normal. \u201cI think there was some deferred damage,\u201d he reflected. \u201cWe haven\u2019t paid for it for a number of years because we haven\u2019t had these extreme storms, so there was more out there that was waiting to fail, just waiting for that extreme event\u2026the series of atmospheric rivers that came through, coupled with the winds, coupled with the high swells that we got, there\u2019s just a lot going on with these storms. Case in point would be Point Cabrillo State Historic Park, in the lighthouse. Over its history, there have been three times that waves have come up over the cliff\u2019s edge and swamped the lighthouse, and this was one of them. Those types of things don\u2019t happen that often. They do happen, but they don\u2019t happen every year\u2026it definitely was out of the ordinary.\u201d\n\nBertels is optimistic that being part of the disaster declaration will make his district eligible for more funding for recovery operations and repairs, especially for the bridges. \u201cI hope that\u2019s the case, because those aren\u2019t going to be cheap,\u201d he predicted; \u201cand it\u2019s going to be hard for us to do it if we don\u2019t have that assistance.\u201d \n\nState parks won\u2019t be closed, but Bertels asks visitors to be patient and try not to get hurt. \u201cKeep an open eye and be careful,\u201d he advised. \u201cStay out (of closed areas) if you can, but if you just can\u2019t help yourself, know that the hazards are there, and keep an eye out for them.\u201d